Contribution by Brigitte Halbmayr, co-author of the book Sexualisierte Gewalt.
Weibliche Erfahrungen in NS-Konzentrationslagern (Vienna: Mandelbaum, 2004).
Organized by the Autonomen Feministinnen Wien and presented at the
Frauengedenken (memorial reading for women victims) which took place in front of
the former camp brothel, in conjunction with the liberation celebration at the
memorial site of the Mauthausen concentration camp on 9 May 2004 (with minor
updates by the author).

Prisoner brothel

Prisoner brothel, presumably spring 1943

In June 1942, Reichsführer-SS Heinrich
Himmler ordered the first prisoner brothel in a concentration
camp to be opened at Mauthausen. A few months later, a brothel
was opened in Gusen. Some ten prisoners from the women's
concentration camp Ravensbrück were forced to work as
prostitutes and were sexually abused. With a formal ‘granting of
privileges’ the SS attempted to provide incentives for male
prisoners to work hard. Only selected prisoners were allowed to
visit the brothel upon submission of a formal application and
payment of a fee. Only prisoners who had received a reward note
from the SS for their work in the arms industry were able to
raise the fee. The inconsistency between the brothels instituted
by the state on the one hand and the prosecution of prostitutes
in the Third Reich, on the other, is remarkable: prostitution
was punishable by imprisonment in a concentration camp.

We are
standing here in front of
the former camp brothel of the Mauthausen concentration camp. A
particularly perfidious form of exploitation of women took place in this
barrack. The SS’s concept was to offer male prisoners, whose work was
particularly important, an additional incentive to perform their duties
by giving them the possibility to have contact with women. Only a small
group of men were afforded this privilege. At the same time, this was
seen as a means of putting a stop to homosexuality among the male
inmates. The political prisoners additionally considered it an attempt
by the SS to intensify the hierarchical organization of the camp
society, thereby weakening solidarity among the prisoners. Neither the
prisoners, nor (certainly not) the SS, gave much thought to the fate of
women compelled to perform forced sexual labor.

The camp brothel remained in
operation for nearly three years, from mid 1942 until spring 1945. A
prisoner’s brothel also existed in Gusen during approximately the same
period. The women brought there to perform forced sexual labor were from
Ravensbrück, a women’s concentration camp. The SS sent many women to
perform this work under false promises, namely, that after six months of
brothel service they would be released from the concentration camp—there
is evidence of only two women being released. For all others, this
promise was merely chicanery. For forced sexual labor, the SS primarily
recruited women whom they had imprisoned in the concentration camps on
the grounds of supposed or actual prostitution: A prime example of the
double standards inherent in SS regulations. Also, only “Aryans” were to
work in the brothels; however, it has been documented that also a Roma
woman from the Austrian province of Burgenland and a Polish woman were
forced to work in the brothel at Mauthausen. This is yet another example
of how the SS flouted their own regulations. It is also known that the
SS were keen on sending lesbian women to the brothels for
“re-orientation,” to put them back on the “right path” of
heterosexuality through sexual contact with men.

What do we know about the lives
of these women who were forced to provide sex to prisoners in a brothel,
such as this one here in barrack 1?—Very, very little. There are almost
no statements from these women. For one, they were not asked. For
another, the shame surrounding what they had suffered, the fear of
humiliation, and the stigmatization even from other survivors led these
women to remain silent about their experiences. Apart from very few
exceptions, our information sources are limited to a few SS documents
and several testimonies from men.

We know from former male
prisoners that the women forced into the brothel received better food,
had better clothes, and had sufficient opportunity to wash themselves.
Based on a barracks plan of barrack 1, it is possible to deduce that
they slept in the back part two to a room, and carried out their
activities in the front part in small, single berths. There were always
ten women bound to the brothel at a time. During the day they were
strictly separated from the male prisoners. They were usually forbidden
to leave the barrack, and were under constant surveillance by female SS
guards. Forming relationships with the “clients” was strictly forbidden,
the men’s short visits to the women—a maximum fifteen minutes—were
observed through peepholes in the entry doors. (There are also numerous
rumors that the SS men, too, abused the women—which was naturally not
permitted, but nonetheless entirely plausible.)

We know about the further fate
of only those women who were sent from the prisoner or SS brothels back
to Ravensbrück; many of these women returned with sexually transmitted
diseases or were pregnant. They were then frequently used for medical
experiments or given abortions. We know that two women who originally
wore the political prisoner’s red triangle were degraded by the SS in
the camp hierarchy and from then on, had to wear the black “asocial”
triangle. Former fellow prisoners in Ravensbrück spoke of the emaciated
figures, gaunt bodies, and the dead gazes of the women who returned from
the brothels.

The existence of camp brothels
makes clear how women during national socialism were sexually humiliated
and exploited as well as robbed of all self-determination. Women were
forced into sex work with male prisoners in a total of ten concentration
camps. Following Mauthausen and Gusen, further brothels were constructed
in the concentration camps Auschwitz-Stammlager, Auschwitz-Monowitz,
Buchenwald, Flossenbürg, Neuen-gamme, Dachau, Sachsenhausen, and
Mittelbau-Dora. In SS jargon, the camp brothel was also called a
“special building,” and was later set up in less prominent places than
here in Mauthausen or Gusen: The SS also began attempting to hush up the
existence of the facilities whenever possible.

Sexual exploitation of
persecuted and imprisoned women was a permanent feature in the national
socialist repression and elimination enterprise. Forced sexual contact
with male prisoners and SS soldiers, forced sterilizations, forced
abortions, medical experiments, rapes, shaving their hair off—the list
of major physical forms of violence is long. Another long list includes
forms of sexualized psychological violence, which ranged from degrading
looks and insinuating slurs to being under constant threat of sexual
attacks by the SS.

The sexual exploitation of the
persecuted and imprisoned women during national socialism represents a
zenith of patriarchal gender relations, which were drafted long before,
and became established over many generations. Normalized concepts of
masculinity and femininity and normalized heterosexuality have been
handed-down in images and attributes over the ages.

Fundamental during the NS era
was the connection between sexual policies and reproductive policies:
women’s sexuality was seen exclusively in terms of its significance for
reproduction and establishing the “Aryan race,” or the “German
Volksgemeinschaft.” Parallel to demure, pure “Aryan women” was the
construct of “the other woman,” whose “carnality,” and “depravity,”
marked her as “socially incapable.” These women were sent to the
concentration camps, classified as “asocial.”

Deviations from the norm, such
as relations to forced laborers or to Jewish men, were punished by
imprisonment in a concentration camp, as were cases in which a future
criminal act was anticipated. Jewish women, as well as Roma and Sinti
women, were in particular danger as they were persecuted for being
non-Aryan.

The differentiation of the women
according to racist categories was thus fundamental. The task of the
“Aryan” German woman was to produce and raise “racially pure” offspring
who would aid in realizing the thousand-year German empire. Women
unwilling to comply with this demand and women who could not (from the
outset, because of the racial laws) were threatened with persecution.

For many years, the experiences
of women in the NS concentration camps, particularly the forced sex
workers, remained unacknowledged. “The great silence” was based, for
one, on the fear that addressing the camp brothels as such would
downplay the horror of a concentration camp and convey a false
impression of living conditions at the camp. For this reason, at the
memorial sites, in the guided tours through the former camp grounds, as
well as in the ground plans of the camp, the existence of a former camp
brothel was covered over whenever possible. Also, the (male) survivors
were interested in keeping this theme taboo, particularly in terms of
their own involvement in brothel activities. On the other hand, this
taboo was also closely tied with the women affected by forced
prostitution. These women were mainly part of group who were forced to
wear the black “asocial” triangle, a persecuted group that lacked
respect among the other groups of prisoners, and whose members have been
subjected to discrimination until the present day. This is visible, for
example, in the claims and entitlements for damage payments in Austria.
It was first in 2005 that those who were persecuted based on their
sexual orientation as supposed “asocials” were recognized as victims of
national socialism in compliance with the Victims Welfare Act (in
addition, forced sterilization is now also considered a form of health
damage caused by persecution). The belated recognition, however, enables
only the very few persons who are still alive to receive a restitution
payment.

The fate of these persecuted
groups fell from sight, as opposed to that of the political prisoners.
The social stigmatization throughout the decades made it impossible for
the women to make their stories public. Also, the (predominantly) male
historical research had a difficult time with this theme, and querying
this group of persecuted persons occurred only gradually.

We do not know how many women
had to perform forced sex work in the prisoner brothels of the
concentration camps, such as here in Mauthausen or Gusen. In all
probability, there was also a brothel for the SS guards near the
Mauthausen camp.

Furthermore, we know from
interviews that the SS soldiers sexually abused women, unrelated to any
specific location and without any regularity, but often—for example,
during banquets at the SS dining halls.

We know very little about all of
these women who were the victims of male violence, and there are very
few written testimonies.

We can no longer ascertain their
memories and pass them on to others as a warning.

We can—and must—keep alive our
memory of the many unknown and nameless victims and thereby grant the
women a belated recognition of their suffering.